“No, no; of course not. It was absurd of me to suggest such a thing, when I know how my aunt adores you,” Pamela said hastily.
In spite of this disavowal, she lay awake half through the night, tormenting herself with all manner of speculations and wild imaginings as to the cause of the separation between George Greswold and his wife and Castellani’s connection with that catastrophe.
She went to Brighton with her uncle next day, Box and the maid accompanying them in a second-class compartment. They put up at an hotel upon the East Cliff, which was more domestic and exclusive than the caravansaries towards the setting sun, and conveniently near Lewes Crescent.
“Shall I go with you at once, uncle?” asked Pamela, as Greswold was leaving the house. “I hope Miss Fausset is not a stern old thing, who will freeze me with a single look.”
“She is not so bad as that, but I will break the ice for you. I am going to see my wife alone before I take you to Lewes Crescent. You can go on the Madeira Walk with Peterson, and give Box an airing.”
George Greswold found his wife sitting alone near the open piano at which Castellani had made such exquisite music the night before. She had been playing a little, trying to find comfort in that grand music of Beethoven, which was to her as the prophecies of Isaiah, or the loftiest passages in the Apocalypse—seeking comfort and hope, but finding none. And now she was gazing sadly at the waste of waters, and thinking that her own future life resembled that barren sea—a wide and sunless waste, with neither haven nor ship in sight.
At the sound of her husband’s footsteps entering unannounced at the further door she started up, with her heart beating vehemently, speechless and trembling. She felt as if they were meeting after years of absence—felt as if she must fling herself upon his breast and claim him as her own again, confessing herself too earthly a creature to live without that sweet human love.
She had to steel herself by the thought of obedience to a higher law than that of human passion. She stood before him deathly pale, but firm as a rock.
He came close up to her, laid his hand upon her shoulder, and looked her in the face, earnestly, solemnly even.